[DAC] Om Guru, Guru, Guru

[Lucilda Cooper]

Search For Knowledge of the Truth...
...the Truth shall set you free!

In India. where Gurus are indigenous, popular wisdom is that one  
should not judge the actions of these inscrutable beings and to  
exercise great care in our dealings and involvement with these  
liberated souls  who function outside of society, as they transcend  
our limited concepts of morality and cultural norms. There is even a  
description of the streetwise slickster as a guru-person.

It seems that in the west we have adopted the Indian guru without  
adopting the Indian attitude towards the guru.

Which may explain the number of wounded souls begging the guru for  
healing while blaming the guru for inflicting their wounds.


Wisdom Transcends Pain, colored pencil/paper, 10" X 12"  ©1977,  
Lucilda Dassardo-Cooper

Forgive me if you think I am belittling your pain, or making light of  
your traumatic experiences at the hands (or feet) of the Guru.
I seek only to share my thoughts and perspective, having grown up in  
the west and lived in India. I hope that it may help with healing, or  
at least provide a window that allows the integration of the  
awareness of cultural differences as a factor in managing and  
transcending pain. This translates to taking responsibility for  
ourselves, and our lives.

We can only have peace if we practice cross-cultural tolerance.

It is also a caution.



Warrior, (From the Hatha Yoga Series) oil/canvas, 64" X 48" ©1987,  
Lucilda Dassardo-Cooper

It takes tremendous courage to allow oneself to be vulnerable.

To open the heart seems to invite pain, but staying hunched over to  
protect the heart can lead to depression. The path of a disciple  
requires the courage of a warrior to face death & the unknown, but  
especially to face one's own shortcomings. This is where  
transformation takes place, when I am willing to see my actions  
unemotionally and correct my failings, while cultivating a "strong  
and compassionate heart."

 From the age of 30 to 40, I had been spending one month of the year  
at an ashram, sometimes in the U.S. and occasionally in India. The  
weeks leading up to my departure to spend time with my Guru found me  
constantly weepy, alternating between longing to be there and yet  
dreading to be there. My mind cringes at being uncomfortable when  
facing the truths of my attitude and behavior. I quaked at having to  
deal with other people's attitudes and agendas.

It seems our miniscule tendencies became magnified out of all  
proportion in the atmosphere permeated with shakti.

This is a blessing, as attitudes become too glaringly obvious to miss  
and a curse because it makes for much bad feeling dealing with  
others. A high degree of tolerance is required, and when it becomes  
unbearable, there is usually an escape to the "silent" tables during  
communal meals.


  Koshas Cover The Atman, oil/canvas, 18" X 24" ©1989,  Lucilda  
Dassardo-Cooper

Yet there was so much light and joy that permeated not only my mind,  
but my body as I practiced daily hatha yoga, chanted and meditated  
morning and evening, and sometimes at midday too, or sometimes all  
day or all night. In an atmosphere of power, so many people thought  
the way to acquire personal power was through the trappings of  
worldly power, so sought position and prestige by being close to the  
Guru and being part of the inner circle.

The closer we get to the fire, the easier it is to get burnt.

Somehow intuitively, I realized that was not such a good strategy,  
and actively tried to be low key. I even tried not to wear my name  
tags so I could remain anonymous to the guru. My mantra at the time  
was to seek knowledge, not attention from the Guru. I wore my name  
tag when it became mandatory, and gradually became known to the Guru  
as my duties bought me to attention.

Then of course like everyone else, I got greedy for attention. My  
justification was that the squeaky wheel gets the oil.

There's A Fire, pastel/paper, 36" X 24", ©1985 Lucilda Dassardo-Cooper

Smoking hash from a communal pipe at the feet of the guru is not  
frowned on in this culture of thousands of years.  I am told that the  
state shops in India used to sell hash from different regions, and  
only U.S. pressure on Rajiv Gandhi (when he was Prime Minister of  
India) put a stop to this commerce and made it a banned product.  
Rajiv is not popular among the sadhus.

Bhang, a psychotropic drink made for the spring rites of Holi in  
India, I am told is still available.

Carlos Castaneda writes about being taught by his guru Don Juan in a  
heightened state of awareness bought on by peyote. No, I was never  
offered any banned substances by my Guru. Our highs came from the  
intensity of our focus and our austerities.

I must admit to being surprised at how many people use cannabis for  
managing chronic pain, and how much more effective it seems, with  
fewer side effects than the mind-deadening drugs provided by the  
pharmaceutical companies. But while it is culturally accepted to have  
the medicine chest full of extremely toxic and deadly drugs, a plant  
used for traditional folk medicine in India and Jamaica is the basis  
for incarceration in the penal system.

(Pharmaceuticals in our drinking water is killing fish and wildlife.  
See AP story :
http://www.chicagotribune.com/news/nationworld/sns-ap-pharmawater-ii, 
1,6982950.story

My Indian friends inform me that it is the duty of the guru to  
provide smoke for the devotee, and the duty of the devotee to provide  
hospitality for the guru, in a culture where ascetics roam and Sadhus  
regard themselves as "clothed by the sky," the Sky Clad comes and  
goes in places public and private with no clothes on, not even a loin  
cloth.

When I was in college I saw how people stopped thinking for  
themselves and give up their personal power to what they see as  
authority figures. We were invited to a weekend workshop for minority  
students in state colleges in Massachusetts. We all attended, not  
knowing what to expect, eager for a weekend at a fine hotel with  
accommodations and meals free.

The first day we were split up and sent to several conference rooms  
with the tables set up in a square but facing outward, and a  
facilitator sitting at a desk nearby. We were told to sit, and I spun  
my chair around to face the table, only to be told by the facilitator  
that I could not do that. To my question of why, he did not respond,  
only giving further commands like taking one shoe off, the value of  
which I could not see. As he did not respond to my questions I did  
not participate in this to me 'foolishness' and proceeded to act out  
in an attempt to get him to respond to my questions. I pulled out my  
camera and began to take photos, while he continued to give orders  
that everyone blindly followed.

I was bemused and a little embarrassed during the lunch break to have  
almost everyone of the facilitators stop by my lunch table and  
chatted, but chalked it up to the fact that I was having a huge ice- 
cream sundae for my lunch, and therefore being a public spectacle.  
Later I found out that every single one of those hundreds of college  
students had all given up their personal power, all except me. I  
should have been proud, but I only felt sad, especially as the leader  
of our student group for whom I had great respect, expressed being  
very angry at my behavior that morning. Until he realized the  
significance of my behavior as opposed to everyone else.

I can only surmise that the students had been so indoctrinated into  
non-violence (this was in the seventies, heir to the sixties non- 
violent social protests) that they had confused acceptance with non- 
violence. I have since come to realize how much of our behavior is a  
result of our unconscious inherited responses.

So yes, we need to take back our personal power which we had given up  
somewhere under the assumption that we were giving up our ego, or  
surrendering to the guru.

Paschimmotanasana, oil/canvas, 16" X 20" ©2003, Lucilda Dassardo-Cooper

No, I don't always do as my Guru instructs.

I was in India at my Guru's ashram and planned to spend a couple of  
days in Mumbai with the family of an artist friend I had met in  
Washington where I was living at the time. When I went for darshan  
and explained my intent, I was given chocolates for my hosts. My Guru  
explained to me that in India one should bring a gift when accepting  
hospitality. I was instructed to give the chocolates as a gift from me.
I disobeyed.

I thought they would be much more appreciated coming from the Guru,  
and I was right.
My hosts accepted it as Guru prasad.


Cosmic Dancer, oil/canvas, 16" X 20" ©1991 Lucilda Dassardo-Cooper

I was three years old when I stood outside in the rain because we  
had  a guest that I was uncomfortable with, as he would always have  
me sit on his lap. I did not like this man, and could not understand  
why my parents were so respectful of him. Later, I realized that  
because he was my father's supervisor, he was treated with great  
deference at our house.

It seems to me that at a very young age I was able to exercise some  
degree of control over my being, and what I would, and would not  
allow. Which is not to say that I have never been forced, but the  
attempted rape by my fellow student and outdoor sketching companion  
ended in fiasco for him. I realized that I was not strong enough to  
fight him off, and I stopped fighting and became as passive as a sack  
of potatoes, which made him as flaccid as the empty potato sack, so  
he could not do the deed.

I have learned that fighting force with force is self-defeating, and  
sometimes doing the unexpected can save us. Sometimes it may mean  
accepting death rather than being forced, as one wanna-be pimp  
realized that I was willing to die rather than be threatened into  
prostitution. This also happened when I was a college student.

"Leave your ego with your shoes" the sign outside the meditation hall  
exhorted us. What if we left our self-importance instead of our  
common sense and personal integrity?

But if one prepares oneself to acquire the ability to forgive, to  
never be offended and hot-tempered then one will begin to get some of  
the strength that one needs in order to be able to tolerate the  
influx of these high energies into one's brain. (Martinus)

The intensity of kundalini arousal can be devastating to the  
unprepared, and even to the initiate.
Seekers of cosmic consciousness have to be mature and strong, both  
physically, mentally and emotionally to withstand the onslaught of  
this force.


Ardha Nareshwara, watercolor/paper with metallic acrylic, ©2002,  
Lucilda Dassardo-Cooper

The science of yoga is not recreation for the frivolous.

It is a great internal inferno that will burn you to ashes.
I have experienced the immense heat, excessive thirst and feelings of  
various body parts on fire. I have seen in the space of several hours  
the world as I know it change suddenly, three times in my life.



Consumed, oil/canvas, 18" X 24" © 1992, Lucilda Dassardo-Cooper

My skin has felt and looked dry like paper, and the fierce heat in my  
lower abdomen and the center of the chest warms my face when I bow my  
head. I see flames in my meditation, and when I close my eyes to go  
to sleep and even had recurring dreams of my house burning down.  
These days I occasionally have intense heat in my palms (which  
increased after I got initiated into Reiki) and my lower abdomen,  
which causes my husband to snuggle up against my back in winter to be  
against the heater, he says.

Not Blushing, (for exhibition with Menopause, The Musical) oil/canvas  
©2005 Lucilda Dassardo-Cooper

After the fire of yoga, Menopause was no sweat.

But on the other hand, I have experienced tremendous love and bliss,  
which made it easier to deal with the turbulent times.
Whenever the path seemed too difficult, the song that pops up in my  
mind helps me cope. "A love like ours is never ever free, you have to  
pay some agony for the ecstasy."

The symbol of yoga (union of the individual with the divine) is a  
lingam, set into a yoni.

This is not only symbolic of the union of the individual soul with  
the divine, it is an expression of primordial energy, which is based  
in desire. The universe comes into being through desire. When we are  
asked to give up desire by the guru, it means desire for fame and  
fortune, our greed for temporary things and self-importance. It does  
not mean sitting around doing nothing and saying "I have no more  
desires, so let me sit here and vegetate."

Last year, at an artist in residency program in India, I had begun a  
series of paintings  that to me seemed to be a pulsation of the  
primordial energy. The paintings included a shivalingam that seemed  
to resonate and vibrate. I have come to see this energy manifesting  
and pulsating and recognized that this same energy was an expression  
of the joyous abandon that was at the heart of Carnival.


Lingam & Peacock Feather, oil/canvas ©2007, Lucilda Dassardo-Cooper

Recognizing the primordial pulsation at the West Indian Festival in  
Boston in the summer, I turned to a friend to say to her that I could  
do this - (dress in a skimpy costume and dance down the street in the  
parade) - as I am no longer so inhibited and self-conscious. She was  
in total agreement. I wonder if our age (half a century) had so much  
to do with our changed attitude. but I think that I had given up my  
self-importance and so not holding myself back from feeling the wild,  
reckless abandon of the pulsating energy.

I have since been working on some paintings of Carnival,  seeking to  
capture expressions of primordial energy.

I do not think that my life would have been so rich and fulfilling  
without shaktipat and years of study at the Guru's feet, a truly  
transforming experience. I have gained courage, mindfulness,  
compassion, joy, happiness, and dropped or at least minimized my  
anxieties, need to please, and confusion. I am grateful to my Guru  
for the lessons learned, even when the learning was painful. In  
hindsight, I can see why it was painful.

I am only sorry that in our inability to understand and tolerate  
cultural differences, we hold the guru to our cultural norms.

We have blocked the access road to the kingdom of magic.

To me that is the greatest tragedy.

People hoping for an apology from the guru for their pain should drop  
that expectation.
Why would an organization open itself to the possibility of lawsuits  
by making an apology?
In this age of litigation, even acknowledging someone's hurt would be  
an admission of guilt, and grounds for a lawsuit.

The Skanda Purana, an ancient text of India, exhorts us never to  
speak ill of the guru, or forsake the guru even if he behaves in a  
self-willed manner.


'Tween Night & Morn, oil/canvas, 48' X 36" ©1989, Lucilda Dassardo- 
Cooper

We need to take responsibility for ourselves, our bodies, our health,  
our well-being and our peace of mind.

We need to stop trying to force our way of life and our cultural  
norms on the rest of the world. When we step outside of our cultural  
biases, we can dwell in harmony and tolerance in this this global  
village we now inhabit called "Planet Earth."

Much Love,
Lucilda

Visit my website: www.Lucilda.com
(You can find more information on unfamiliar terms by cutting and  
pasting in google)
This is in honor of my Mother, my first Guru who left her body on  
this date, in gratitude for enabling me to be myself.
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